Schnipsel
by nambnb
Summary: snippets concerning DMMd, mostly concerning Noiz at the moment
1. 1st Rhyme

His enemy's attack headed against Noiz had hit him full-force. It wasn't because Noiz hadn't thought up any kind of counter measurements or because this was his first Rhyme battle ever, though, but simply because Noiz had wanted to feel the pain this would cause him ever since he had heard of Rhyme's abilities to process backlashes due to the player receiving a hit.

It was a weird feeling, pretty unpleasant now that he thought about it. His hand had been burnt by the virtual fire of the attacking Allmate avatar and the 'pain' crept up his fingers, arm and up to his shoulder even due to the force of the hit. Noiz looked at his aching limb astonished, not saying a word. His eyes were torn open and a look of sheer disbelief that something like this could really happen to him was plastered on his face - though 'really' was relative, seeing that all of this was just an illusion created in ones mind.

Still… That was pain, right? Pain, like anybody else could feel it in their head at least.  
What an odd kind of sensation.  
A sensation… feeling…

Noiz lips slowly drew up to form a grin and first a short huff, than a series of chuckles escaped his throat until he laughed like a mad man. His enemy was irritated by Noiz' reaction but then gathered his wits and chose to attack Noiz again and again if he was not intelligent enough to put up any counter measurements against a direct hit to the player - it would be an easy win that way. Noiz just continued laughing while his HP dropped to zero in an instant, not minding his loss in the least. He had gained something far more valuable instead: An impression of what pain could feel like.


	2. Play pretend

They had arrived at a rather weird place this time, he thought. Wim's parents had decided to bring their son along to this "researching facility" as they called it. They had been on a trip to visit Wim's grandmother on his mother's side, who happened to be Japanese and on their way back they had a business meeting with a man named Toue who was the head of the place they currently visited. It was called "Oval Tower", even though it didn't look anything like oval at all for Wim's understanding of the shape this tower had. With all those braces surrounding the tower's core it might look somewhat round on the outside, but for a child's eyes it reminded him more of a syringe or a rocket.  
He didn't like that place at all. It was too white, too sanitary, too unfriendly. And the worst part of it all was the lack of toys in the rooms they went through. There were mostly people in white coats rushing around the floors who seemed pretty busy and the complicated words passing between his parents and this Toue-man as they exchanged courtesies and expert knowledge between themselves was beyond boring for a little boy. Wim sighed. Maybe he could just run away? But then his knee would hurt him again for sure. He had fallen down on the hart pavement just a few hours ago and his knee had bled and pained him pretty badly even as he just stood next to his mother, holding her hand. A plaster was put onto the wound and his mother had tried to kiss it better, but it still hurt a lot. Wim bit his lower lip and was about to start whining if they couldn't just go home already, when his look fell on the corner of the room.

There was a boy around his age - well maybe a few years older - with black hair and eyes standing next to a pair of white-robed researchers, who gave him a piece of candy, pet his head and then seemingly waved him good-bye. Wim looked closer and noticed that one of the boy's eyes was bandaged, same with his wrist and the elbow on his other arm. Maybe he had been treated in here for an injury?  
Suddenly the kid seemed to realize that Wim was looking at him and turned his head in his direction, smiling. Then he waved over to him in this weird way he knew from his grandmother. It meant he should come closer. Maybe he wanted to play with him?  
Looking up to his mother, she and his father were still discussing things with the Toue-man and Wim was bred to not intterupt adults when they were talking, but it looked liked they might go on and on for hours to come and the kid over there might help him pass the time, so Wim shyly tugged at his mother's arm until she looked down to him.

"Can I go play with the kid over there?", Wim asked, pointing his finger at the stranger in the corner of the room. Suddenly even the Toue-man's attention fell on him and his potential playmate and his mother apologized for Wim's question for whatever reason she had. But the Toue-man only laughed and said that it was okay.  
"That is Sei over there, he's like a son to me and he doesn't have a lot of kids around to play with, so if Wim-kun is willing to spend some time with him, I don't mind."  
He gave Wim a smile that looked friendly, but Wim was wary, since something about his smile seemed fake. Nevertheless he had allowed him to play with the kid named Sei over there, so his mother let go of his hand and he headed over to him.

Sei smiled at him as he approached him and Wim introduced himself.  
"Hello, I'm Wim. Nice to meet you."

"Hello.", the boy answered him with a smile, his voice was low but friendly, "I'm Sei. Do you want to play with me?"

Wim nodded and Sei told him they could play tag in the long corridors if he wanted to, but then Wim was reminded of his bad knee and shook his head.  
"I'm sorry, but my knee hurts too much for that. Can we play something else, please?"

"Your knee hurts?", Sei repeated and lookd at the band-aid plastered on Wim's leg. Then he smiled at him and his eyes seemed to sparkle.  
"Don't worry about it. You just need to forget about the pain and all will be fine!"

"Forget about the pain?"

Sei's words seemed to strangely echo in Wim's mind and he felt like he simply couldn't avert his eyes from Sei's when he nodded and told him:  
"Yes, that's the way I do it. I just pretend the pain isn't there, so you should do the same. It's really easy."

"Pretend the pain... isn't there..."  
Wim didn't believe that something like this would work, but then he told himself to forget about the pain just to try it and put his weight onto his bruised leg.  
It really didn't hurt anymore.  
Wim was astonished. It really was like Sei had just said.  
Wim smiled over his whole face and then agreed to play tag with Sei as long as he wanted him to.

* * *

Later that day Wim and his parents took the plane back to their home country and Wim was happy that the spell Sei had told him still prevented his knee from hurting him, even if he didn't need it to work anymore. But not feeling the pain was great, he thought. He fell down often and it was so annoying that it hurt everytime. Now he could choose to pretend it wouldn't hurt and be fine again.

A few days later Wim wished he could stop pretending, though. He had fallen down so hard that his bone was broken and had pierced his skin, but it hadn't hurt so Wim had tried to get up again, making everything worse as he fell again. His mother had screamed at him not to move anymore and his father was shouting at him if he was an idiot since he was obviously hurt badly and it must hurt so bad, how could he even think of getting up again after that?

But Wim didn't feel hurt in the least. He saw the blood and his bone peeking through his skin. But pain?  
There simply was no pain at all. If anything there was a dull, irritating sensation running up his leg.  
He didn't feel any pain though.  
Maybe his body still played pretend even now.


End file.
